By Kara O’Neil, Staff Writer
After years of work and expense, 100 Seneca in Oil City is nearing a major milestone — the opening of the first and fifth floors of the landmark Seneca Street building by the end of this year.
“Investing in these buildings is investing in the future and it shows a belief in a prosperous future,” Emily Lewis, the executive director of the Venango County Economic Development Authority, said.
Lewis wants to see 100 Seneca become an example of what is possible when it comes to renovating old buildings in Oil City, Franklin and the surrounding area.
For Lewis, transforming 100 Seneca and the blood, sweat and tears that has gone into it over the past several years has been “so worth it.”
One of the key takeaways from the experience for Lewis has been the importance of keeping up with maintenance.
“It is cheaper not to let a building sit vacant and defer maintenance. That is when you get big costs. It is infinitely better to head that off,” Lewis said.
Breathing new life into 100 Seneca has come with an estimated price tag of about $16 million, and the project has been mostly funded through grants over the past several years.
Grant money the authority received was already allocated by the federal and state governments to be spent on projects, Lewis said, so if it wasn’t coming to Venango County it would have gone somewhere else.
Venango County purchased the former bank building in 2017 for $95,000 and turned it over to the economic development authority in 2018.
Here is a breakdown of the funding so far at the beginning of 2024:
Phase I: 2018 to 2021
Renovations began with selective demolition and full environmental abatement as well as replacing the roof and the exterior windows and doors at a cost of $2,057,719.
A Redevelopment Assistance Capital Program (RACP) grant of $1 million that required a match of $617,861 in county funds made up the bulk of the money spent for construction in the first phase.
The grant was originally awarded for another project, the multimodal hub in Oil City, Lewis said, but after the grant was awarded, PennDOT offered to cover the bulk of the costs to build the hub.
At that point, the Office of Budget told the county it could keep the $1 million if it was used for another project on the North Side of Oil City, Lewis said.
The county chose to use the $1 million RACP grant and the county match that went it for the 100 Seneca renovations, she added.
The rest of the money used in phase one came from several other grants — a $219,158 Venango County Community Development Block Grant, $140,700 from the PNC Charitable Trust and $80,000 from the Pennsylvania Historic and Museum Commission (PHMC).
After a pause when everything was shut down in the spring of 2020 due to COVID-19 edicts, construction resumed.
“Nobody wanted to be bidding out projects in 2020, but that’s where we were,” Lewis said, noting the supply chain issues and inflation that plagued those days.
Phase II: July 2021 to now
Next came abating the asbestos in the chimney of the building, building out the critical infrastructure and masonry stabilization, as well as the fifth floor buildout.
Abating the chimney cost $48,500, Lewis said, noting that took care of the last of the asbestos in the building. That contract was ratified in July 2021.
The contract for critical infrastructure, including HVAC, electric, elevator, water and sewage, was awarded to Hudson Construction at a cost of $4,718,515 in March 2022.
The bill for the masonry stabilization came in at $401,792. That contract was also awarded in March 2022.
The fifth floor buildout began in January and is slated to be completed in August. The contract for that work was $1,667,000.
The second phase of the project has been funded by a variety of grants and congressional earmarks.
A total of $3.3 million came from Economic Development Authority and Appalachian Regional Commission grants, $2,250,000 came from RACP, $584,016 from the county’s American Rescue Plan money, $97,058 from Venango County CDBG funds, $50,000 from the PNC Charitable Trust and a $5,000 Oil City Main Street façade grant.
Of the two congressional earmarks the 100 Seneca project received, $487,816 was spent in phase two.
An insurance claim due to a water leak during COVID added $61,917 to the pot used during the second phase.
Phase III: Yet to come
The low bid for fitting out the first floor came in at $6,105,000, Lewis said. She added that the contract for the first floor work will likely be awarded later this month.
An additional $285,447 is estimated for kitchen equipment.
On the first floor, construction is slated to finish in November with the tenant, Side Hustle Brews and Spirits, in the building during the last three months of work fitting out the space.
Side Hustle Brews and Spirits is planning to open a distillery in 100 Seneca.
That phase will be funded in part by a $3,189,140 Economic Development Administration (EDA) travel, tourism and outdoor recreation grant, a $1,457,000 ARC POWER grant, a $200,000 Local Share Account (LSA) grant, $100,000 PHMC grant and $50,000 from the PNC Charitable Trust.
The remaining $1,396,307 will be paid by Venango County unless grants can be obtained to defray the cost, Lewis said.
She added that she has applied for several grants including a $300,000 LSA grant, a $500,000 Keystone Communities grant through the Department of Community and Economic Development and a RACP grant for the full amount still needed.
“It depends on what we get. The plan is to reduce the county’s costs as much as we can,” Lewis said.
Further in the Future
The goal is to get the first and fifth floors completed and filled with tenants before the authority turns its attention to the second, third and fourth floors of the building, Lewis said.
She’s confident there is market demand for the space and tenants will be attracted to 100 Seneca.
As the project has been moving along, Lewis said prospective tenants had expressed interested in renting space, but the timeline for getting the space ready was so fluid it proved to be a hindrance.
At this point, the finish line is in sight for the first and fifth floors, and a pro forma aimed at making 100 Seneca a self-sustaining enterprise is in place.
Filling up the renovated space is the next step and one of the things that makes the project so worthwhile, Lewis said.
Read the full article from The Derrick here.